When it comes to computer data storage, it can seem like we are running out of numbers. If you are old enough, you may remember when diskette storage was measured in kilobytes in the 1980s. If you are a little younger, you are probably more familiar with the thumb drives denominated in gigabytes or hard drives that hold terabytes today.
Humanity’s unfathomable data footprint
But we are now producing data at an unprecedented rate. As a result, we are going to need to be able to grasp numbers so large that they seem almost beyond human comprehension. In order to get a sense for the new realm into which we are entering, consider this: Market intelligence firm IDC estimates that the total global creation and consumption of data amounted to 59 zettabytes in 2020 — that’s 59 trillion gigabytes in old money.
Yet while the total volume of data in existence is now at an almost unfathomable scale, the rate at which it is growing is even more striking. Back in 2012, IBM calculated that 90%…